Sophy Daily | Graphic Design

Project Statement

Makajiki is a high-end pescatarian restaurant nestled in the coastal hills of Sausalito, California. It is one of the few restaurants in the United States that serves meals in the Kaiseki style, offering a fresh and vibrant take on a traditional Japanese multi-course tasting menu.

There are three menus; the main one offers the mutli-course menu, the second offers alcohol pairings, and the third gives appetizer options for a raw bar, where fresh seafood and sashimi is served.

A tasting menu is a collection of several dishes in small portions, served by a restaurant as a single meal. Some restaurants and chefs specialize in tasting menus, while in other cases, it is a special or a menu option. Tasting menus may be offered to provide a sample of a type of cuisine, a house specialty, or to take advantage of fresh seasonal ingredients. Coming to the mainstream in the 1990s, tasting menus evolved into elaborate showcases highlighting the culinary artistry of the chef. In the context of the kaiseki menu, which utilizes fresh and high quality ingredients, Makajiki presents a seasonal menu that moves with the tides of the sea, revolving around the eight phases of the moon. The brand mission of the restaurant is to fufill a perfect, sustainable relationship between man and sea through a transparently-sourced pescatarian tasting menu in the kaiseki method. This menu structure reflects the phases of the moon, which is inexorably tied with the movement of the tides. As a result, the seasonal menu transitions from one course to the other with perfect complements, with top-shelf alcoholic matches.

The name Makajiki (kanji: 真旗魚) translated literally to “true marlin,” but is more commonly used as the Japanese name for the striped marlin, the highest quality type of marlin that is sold in Japanese fish markets. The typeface used for the kanji in the logo is based on an early tenth century tensho-tai font for hanko, or stamps used around that time. The typeface for the English title is called The Seasons, a chic and stylish display serif. The supporting typeface for the text on the menu is Montserrat, a robust, open and harmonious geometric sans serif used in many luxury brands today.

The wave graphic is based on a traditional wave pattern dating back to the 6th century called seigaiha. To bring this powerful, flowing pattern to life, I hand cut linoleum stamps and printed the design onto paper with india ink, which I then scanned into the computer and converted into vectors. The logo was also designed this way by etching the kanji into the stamp and scanning the print.